Can This Be Wrong?
by Aurorax
Summary: Neal has always been the one to take, but now he is the only one who can hold everything together. Does he have the strength? Written for the Peculiar Pairings Ficathon at Goldenlake fiefgoldenlake dot proboards dot com , warning for a slash pairing.


**Warning: Slash Pairing

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"I had thought that I would find you here."

Of course he had known. This was- had been- Owen's place in particular, to seek peace, refuge, and the books he loved so much.

Neal looked up from the worn surface of the desk he was studying, the carvings and inkstains a silent testament to generations of pages who had come before. He would recognize that voice as long as he lived- deep, with the confident tone of one who knew his words would be attended to and just a hint of ice around the edges to warn anyone feeling differently. The expression, though, that was new; he would never have imagined that Lord Wyldon of Cavall could ever look so defeated.

"How is she?" He could only mean Kel, just returned to the Palace with the Own a few hours earlier to attend the next day's hangings. It had been one of her first acts as Lady Knight Commander, the sentencing to death of the fifteen bandit men who had claimed the lives of Sir Owen and Lady Margarry of Jesslaw.

"It's hard to tell with her, always. And she says she's fine, but I wouldn't expect anything else, since she's still afraid that showing emotion makes her seem weak. I barely got a chance to see her before she was whisked away to meet with the King, but I, well…" Here his voice faltered, as he fought to find words to explain what he had seen in his best friend's gaze. Or rather, what he had missed- even when she had her mask on, her eyes had always betrayed some hint of what she was feeling, windows to her true self that could ease any burden or light up a room with a single glance. But as she was hurried past him this morning, Kel had looked up at him for just a moment, and all he had seen was emptiness, devoid even of pain; it was as if something had died inside of her, a fire extinguished that could never be rekindled. Then the Royal courier had implored her once more to hurry ("Please, my Lady, we must not keep the King waiting.") and she was gone, out of reach before he could offer a single word of comfort.

So he finally settled for "I've never seen her look like that before," knowing that the other man would appreciate how much was left unsaid. Neal sometimes wondered if Lord Wyldon understood Kel better even then he did, better than anyone really. They were more alike than either cared to admit, completing their duties with the same steady resolve and meeting the world with the same unerring devotion to what they felt was right. And now, facing tragedy with the same hidden pain, they both seemed to need something from him, something their pride would not let them ask for.

It was rare for him to be the one who needed to give, the strong one. Usually it was the other way around. He was a healer of course, but the comfort he gave was a gift of the Gods, not something he had worked for, not really. Not a part of himself. Looking up at his former training master, Neal knew that not everyone was so lucky- Wyldon had given so much more to all of them, the hard years measured in the scars and lines that marred his handsome face. It meant that he lost so much more for each of them who fell, in war or in sickness or to the Chamber. And now Owen, Owen and his youngest daughter, a final blow all the more harsh in its coming during the rebuilding period, that silent peace after the horrors of war.

The silence rang between them, almost tangible here in the small library alcove where the air hung heavy with forgotten dreams of childhood. There was so much to say, but none of it could change what happened; words had never seemed so powerless, so meaningless before. But the silence left a void into which the sorrow flooded; it gave power to those memories they were both trying to avoid. Neal stood up, allowing the muffled scrape of the chair across the worn floorboards and his own too-heavy footfalls to do what his voice could not, dispelling the silence and the space between them.

Looking back, he didn't have a reason. All he knew was that with the world falling down around him, he needed more than anything to preserve those constants, those things that would never change. And one of those constants had always been the man in the doorway, who would always be too stiff and too formal and too honorable. Who would always be the Stump. So when their eyes had met and Neal had seen the stiffness beginning to crumble, all he had known was that it couldn't happen. So he had crossed the room and reminded this man who had taught him so much while asking for so little- nothing, really, except for the respect which should have come naturally- that he was not alone.

There was a hardness and a desperation in their touch that he had never experienced before. It was intoxicating in its novelty and its clear-headed forgetfulness, the refusal of wrong and of wrong-doing that was certainty rather than assertion. He had expected surprise, resistance even, but he found none; nor was there the awkward shyness that accompanied a new woman. Wyldon wasn't afraid to save himself, knew that this was the only way, and that acceptance brought them farther than comfort and farther than consolation. No, this was hunger and fiery need, a desire to forget one's self in another.

The heat pulsed through his body as the rough scars ran beneath his hands. There was no restraint, no fear of breaking something fragile, and that in itself was a new kind of release. He would be missed, of course; they both would. But the moment and the night had power to draw him in, and he hadn't the desire to fight it, had he been able to find the strength. For a few hours, everything was right with the world, and tomorrow was forgotten along with the tunics and boots.

It was Kel who found them the next morning, moving silently through the pre-dawn gloom to ease open the heavy oak door. Hadn't they locked it? Careless, when they had so much to lose, but no one had been in their right mind at the time. Neal waited for her reaction, knowing even her Yamani-calm features would register some shock, though she would hide it quickly for his sake and for her own. And, of course, for the man who laid next to him, meeting her eyes with a look that offered no apology and asked for no forgiveness, the man who she respected above all others, above all reason. It never came, the reaction he almost hoped for- disapproval would have been a relief simply because it was the proper reaction, what should have happened had the world not been turned upside-down.

But she had simply said "Stay by me today?" and walked out, not waiting for an answer, not needing one. She knew he would stand by her, as she had often stood by him, because he was Neal and they needed one another. Just as she had known she wouldn't find him alone, or with his new wife. Only afterwards did he realize that she had come from the wrong direction, from the barracks of the Own and of the Riders rather than the knight's quarters, which she had yet to move out of. And she had come in a tunic that wasn't her own, the memory of a night of borrowed comfort and borrowed company. He wasn't the only one who had feared to be alone in the dark, when the memories came.

Standing among his yearmates at the trial, he held his wife's tiny hand tightly in his own. He could feel her fear like something tangible in the air between them, and gave her hand what he hoped to be a reassuring squeeze; it had been wrong to leave her alone last night, when she needed him the most. Kel stood at his side, just out of reach; she wouldn't allow herself the comfort of his touch, not out here in public, not when there was already question about her ability to lead the Own. Still, something about her seemed to be imploring him silently to make it all go away, to help her wake up from this nightmare- all the things she refused to say aloud. He wondered how much it had taken, just to come look for him that morning.

Across the gallows he looked at the proud face he had learned so well in the flickering candlelight and dark shadows of the night. It took a certain strength to sit silently and watch your child's killers meet their own death, but Wyldon had always been strong. Neal tried to meet the steady gaze with his own, fought to find the same composure, but he couldn't hold it for long. Soon his head bowed and his eyes fell once more to the churned mess of grass and mud beneath his feet. He was afraid to look longer, afraid of seeing that same look of despair seeping in to the stone-harsh features. He was afraid of what the night would bring, knowing it would be harder this time, harder to comfort and to love and to put back together again. Most of all, he was afraid because he didn't know who to go to at the close of the day, which of the three most important people in his life would need him most.

Neal shivered in the chill winter air and wondered if he had strength enough to heal them all.


End file.
